ExpressIndia.com – Nikhil Roshan
Satish Alekar’s 30-year-old play, Begum Barve, returns to Mumbai with its original cast
There are plays written that come and inhabit the limelight momentarily. Some stay a bit longer. But a few come back to consistently enamour, puzzle and delight audiences by their sheer mastery and insight. Satish Alekar’s Begum Barve is one such play. And 30 years after it was first staged, the play is returning to a Mumbai stage with the original cast.
Located in mundane, middle-class environs in Pune, the play revolves around Barve (Chandrakant Kale)-a female impersonator with an unfulfilled wish to perform her dream role. Barve worships Balgandharva, a yesteryear icon of a fading tradition of sangeet-natak. She lives under the staircase of a building with a drunk, short-tempered and at times menacing Shyamrao (Mohan Agashe). Living